Federal Communications Commission "FCC XX-XXX" STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN AJIT PAI Re: Implementing Section 503 of RAY BAUM’S Act, WC Docket No. 18-335; Rules and Regulation Implementing the Truth in Caller ID Act of 2009, WC Docket No. 11-39. In the first half of this year alone, the FCC received more than 35,000 consumer complaints about caller ID spoofing. Whether it’s neighborhood spoofing, which makes it look like an incoming call is from a local number, or spoofing the number of a company or government agency that consumers know and trust, scammers continue to hide behind spoofed numbers to deceive and defraud American consumers out of money and personal information. And as a bipartisan coalition of more than 40 state attorneys general has warned, spoofing fraud is by no means limited to traditional phone calls made from within the United States: “As State Attorneys General on the front lines fighting these scammers, we are acutely aware that many of these calls are coming from criminals, located overseas, utilizing caller ID spoofing, and we are also seeing more scams being perpetrated via text message.” Reply Comments of Forty-Two (42) State Attorneys General, WC Docket No. 18-335, at 3 (filed May 3, 2019). Today, we rely on new authority provided by Congress in RAY BAUM’S Act to update our rules to cover these additional forms of spoofing. First, we extend the reach of our current Truth in Caller ID rules to cover communications originating outside the United States directed at American consumers. Second, we expand the scope of communications covered by our Truth in Caller ID rules to include text messaging and alternative voice services, such as one-way interconnected VoIP services. With these changes, the FCC will be able to go after bad actors who spoof text messages and those overseas who prey on consumers in this country. And with today’s Second Report and Order, we continue our multi-pronged approach to combatting malicious caller ID spoofing. We’ve issued more than $200 million in forfeitures and proposed another $37.5 million in fines for violations of our Truth in Caller ID rules in the last year alone. We’ve established rules allowing voice service providers to block certain spoofed calls before they reach consumers’ phones, and we recently clarified that phone companies may offer call-blocking services by default. We’ve also called on the phone industry to “trace back” illegal spoofed calls and text messages to their original sources and to implement by the end of this year a caller ID authentication framework called SHAKEN/STIR. We recently proposed creating a safe harbor for call-blocking programs targeting unauthenticated calls, which may be potentially spoofed. And we’ve proposed to mandate implementation of SHAKEN/STIR if major voice service providers fail to do so by the end of 2019. But much work remains to be done, and we will not relent in our efforts to fight the persistent problem of spoofing fraud. For their work to protect American consumers from this scourge of civilization, I’d like to thank Pamela Arluk, Allison Baker, Annick Banoun, Micah Caldwell, Rebecca Chambers, Alex Espinoza, Justin Faulb, Lisa Hone, Melissa Kirkel, and Kris Monteith from the Wireline Competition Bureau; Erin Boone, Garnet Hanley, Donald Stockdale, Jennifer Salhus, and Suzanne Tetreault from the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau; Malena Barzilai, Ashley Boizelle, Tom Johnson, Rick Mallen, Linda Oliver, and William Richardson from the Office of General Counsel; Eric Burger, Octavian Carare, Pramesh Jobanputra, Giulia McHenry, and Emily Talaga from the Office of Economics and Analytics; Jim Schlichting from the International Bureau; Parul Desai and Daniel Stepanicich from the Enforcement Bureau; and Jerusha Burnett, Mark Stone, and Kim Wild from the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau. 2